1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and method for recording data and file system information for managing such data.
2. Description of the Related Art
When data is recorded as a file in a recording apparatus, it is customary to generate file system information containing information indicating the recording position of the data inside the recording apparatus and the like and to thereafter manage the recorded data using the file system information.
The related art method of recording the generated file system information records the file system information on the same recording medium as the data but in a different block (i.e., a region used as a recording unit) to the block in which the data is recorded (e.g., Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2005-149638 (Paragraphs 0124 to 0130)).
However, when this method is used for a recording apparatus where high access performance (i.e., a high bit rate for recording and playing back data) is required, such as a video server used to record and play back AV (audio/video) data at a TV channel, the recording medium will be frequently accessed just to record the file system information, thereby lowering the available bit rate for recording and playing back data. Thus, to maintain the bit rate for recording and playing back data, it is preferable to lower the frequency with which the file system information is generated or updated and/or to lower the priority of writes of the file system information onto the recording medium and record/update the file system information in only a cache memory. However, it may not be possible to properly manage the recorded data.
There is also a method where the recording/playback bit rate for data is maintained by recording the file system information on a different recording medium to the recording medium on which the data is recorded.
However, with such method, even if there is free space available on the recording medium used for recording data, the recording of data will have to be stopped if there is no more free space on the recording medium used to record the file system information. To avoid such situation, it is preferable to provide extra capacity on the recording medium used for the file system information, which means that a large-capacity recording medium has to be provided in addition to the recording medium used to record the data.